


Three Times a Pattern

by Udunie



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Courtship, I don't know what happened but this has no sex, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, as in peter is a bit creepy, just the usual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-10
Updated: 2017-01-13
Packaged: 2018-09-16 16:30:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9280001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Udunie/pseuds/Udunie
Summary: Stiles was man enough to admit when he made a mistake.And boy, did he make one when he expected college to be smooth sailing after the hell hole that was his home town. You would think that having supernatural creatures out for you friends’ - and occasionally your own - blood would be enough to put things into perspective, but college? College was a whole other clusterfuck.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LaughingCat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaughingCat/gifts).



> This is written for the lovely, amazing LaughingCat, who was generous enough to donate for the FUCK 2016 Charity Month!
> 
> Thank you so much, I hope you don't mind that this ended up being two chapters ^^;;;
> 
> Also, many thanks to Emma, who keeps me together

Stiles was man enough to admit when he made a mistake. 

And  _ boy _ , did he make one when he expected college to be smooth sailing after the hell hole that was his home town. You would think that having supernatural creatures out for you friends’ - and occasionally your own - blood would be enough to put things into perspective, but college? College was a whole other clusterfuck.

First of all, 8am classes. He took two, because he was silly enough to believe that between his fucked-up sleep schedule and his ADHD he would have no problem taking those. Ha. Ha ha.

Maybe he would have been able to pull it off if not for his roommate, Thomas, who for some reason went by ‘Thos’. The guy had an actual porn mustache, and the libido to go with it. Stiles found himself sexiled three nights just on his first week, all of which he spent on the small, bumpy couch in the common room that faintly smelled like fish. He was pretty sure the seniors dragged it in from a street corner.

To say that he was off to a somewhat rough start was an understatement.

And on top of all that, one of his teachers had a vendetta against him. She was… Pretty much like good old Adrian Harris back in high school, except for being a woman. But the sneering and the picking on people? That was all the same.

Okay, so Stiles might have corrected her on a few factual fallacies during the first lecture. That probably didn’t help, in hindsight.

It was… disheartening. He didn’t know what he’d been thinking, but he thought that college was, you know? The time of one’s life. A never ending party. New friends, new opportunities, new things to learn.

Instead, at the end of his first month, he was sitting in the common room at two in the morning, eating luke-warm ramen from the cup with a drunk freshman snoring beside him. Thos was having company again and Stiles had a paper due at eight in the morning, sharp, that he hasn't even started yet.

His laptop whirred loudly, flashing a warning about the battery and then died.

***

By the time midterms rolled around Stiles was worn to the bone. He was constantly tired and hungry, teetering on the thin line between unconsciousness and a panic attack 24/7. He was starting to think that there was something wrong with him.

Because the others? Lydia was like a fish in the water over at MIT and Scott - along with Kira - seemed to be having a smoothless long-distance relationship, colored with parties and an active social life.

Meanwhile Stiles was lonely, homesick and miserable in equal parts.

It felt like he was coming down with something - that something being either depression or a nervous breakdown.

***

It all started on a friday. Stiles had two exams, because of course he did. As he made his way up the stairs to his dorm room, he wondered if Thos would be in. He hoped not, because more often than not, that meant sleeping on the couch. He couldn’t remember the last time he had a good night’s sleep, mainly because he spent the last two days in the library, getting by solely on what he could get from the vending machine on his last few bucks.

Fuck his life, seriously. 

Yeah, he knew that he could ask his dad for a bit more money. His old man looked pretty dubious when Stiles told him how much he would need - how little, to be exact - and he was absolutely sure that he would give him a few life-saving dollars in a heartbeat. But. As much as he loved his dad, they didn’t have the kind of money to just throw it around. Not when the hospital bills from all the times they got hurt during his high school career still kept coming.

Recently he wasn’t even sure the wanted to continue with this major at all. Fuck, he’d wanted to work for law enforcement since he was old enough to know what it was, but at the same time… He wouldn’t have admitted it for the world, but sometimes, when they were looking at crime-scene photos, or at blood splatter patterns, his mind flashed back to all the times he saw spilled blood, or dead bodies in real life. 

No. He just needed sleep. That would make everything better. The one good thing to come out of his college experience so far was that he lost all anxiety about sleeping. Actually, if he knew for certain that he would be possessed by a thousand years old supernatural creature if he fell asleep? Right now, he wouldn’t give a fuck.

Stiles gave a sigh of relief when he saw that there was no sock/panty/bra on the door handle of his room. Lately Thos had been getting disgustingly creative with his signs, going as far as pulling a - thankfully unused - condom on the knob on one memorable occasion. 

The room was blessfully empty and dark, the window open just a bit, but enough to air out the smell of sex that seemed to linger ever since his roommate put his foot inside.

Stiles wanted to cry with bliss, but realized that it would take too much energy, so he just fell into his bed, asleep before his head hit the pillow.

***

He started to get a bit suspicious when Thos didn’t show up the next day. Or the one after that. His roommate might have been a slacker, but he didn’t look like he was about to drop out.

He shot him a text, just to make sure he wasn’t in a ditch somewhere, dead from a fast developing STD.

_ im doing online classes now, b back nxt sem pls don’t write again  _ was the reply. 

Stiles… couldn’t say he wasn’t happy to see Thos go - at least for the rest of the semester, but that was weird, right? That was not a normal thing to happen.

But, he had his - numerous - exams to worry about, so in the end he just shrugged it off. Thos was fucking weird, and while this was unusual, it wasn’t completely out of character.

***

Life got a lot more easy after Thos got out of his hair, but it didn’t make everything peachy.

Most of his time was still spent in the library, eyes going blurry from reading for six hours straight. His policing class was kicking his ass. It was the one that Harris 2.0 was teaching, and after a few comments she dropped, Stiles was expecting that he will ‘somehow’ end up with a line of test questions made just to fuck with him specifically.

It was boring too. 

Stiles yawned and stretched his legs. He was going to get muscle atrophy if he kept this up for much longer. His stomach growled. Damn. When was the last time he ate? He reached the point where he was out of  _ ramen _ .

He dug around in his pocket until he found some loose change and got up, joints creaking like he was eighty and not eighteen.

There were a couple of vending machines out in the foyer, and he made his way over slowly, his legs a bit unsteady with disuse.

Stiles stopped in front of them, hesitating.

There was a snack machine. And a coffee machine. 

And he only had money for one.

For a brief second, he considered the small axe in the box on the wall. This was an emergency, wasn’t it? But then he realized that if he got banned from the library, his life might just be over, so he took a deep breath and got himself an espresso.

He could take hunger pangs, he couldn’t take Harris 2.0 looking smugly at his failed test.

In the end, it looked like he lucked out, because on his way back he found a snickers fallen under the table next to his. He couldn’t remember anybody sitting there - or the bar being there before he went out - but. But it wasn’t just any snickers. It was a fucking  _ slice and share _ ; enough calories to get a college student through half a week.

He wasn’t about to look gift candies in the mouth. Or whatever.

***

Stiles couldn’t have been sure yet, but he was relatively confident that he passed his policing class, despite Harris 2.0’s best efforts. At least he didn’t think she would risk intentionally marking him wrong, not when she knew he would go to the dean about it.

Anyway. It was over. His very last exam for the semester. 

Originally he wanted to drive home right after, but on the way back to the dorm he started seeing sparkling spots swimming in his vision from exhaustion, so that was probably not a good idea. His dad would understand; he didn’t want Stiles driving this late anyway.

He didn’t want to think about it, but he had the awful suspicion that he wasn’t just tired. His muscles hurt the way they only did when he had a fever. So,  _ so  _ not good. Hopefully some rest would nip that thing in the bud. He didn’t want to go home only to spend his whole time off sick.

***

The nasty surprise came when he stepped into his building, blowing on his blue fingers, because it was getting cold outside. Colder than it had any right to be.

Except. It wasn’t any warmer in the dorm either.

Stiles wanted to bang his head against something. Something hard, that would just put him out of his misery nice an easy.

He could see a few people shuffling around, with blankets thrown over their shoulders, and then he noticed the handwritten note on the board.

‘The heating broke down. Maintenance is in progress but it might take a few days.’

Fuck. His. Life.

Stiles made his way upstairs, wondering if he wouldn’t be better off sleeping in the jeep instead. But to be honest, good old Betsy wasn’t exactly stellar in the insulation department, even if the heating more-or-less worked.

His whole body felt heavy with exhaustion, and he had no idea how he would fall asleep in this cold. Maybe he had an extra towel in his stuff, he could use it as a blanket. As things stood, piling every piece of clothing he owned on top of himself was his best bet at survival.

Their hall was almost completely empty since most of the students - who didn’t have sadistic teachers - already left. Great. He would freeze to death completely alone. His corpse wouldn’t be found until spring.

By the time he closed the door of his room behind himself, he was shaking, his skin feeling clammy.

He turned on the lights and pulled everything he so carefully packed away out of his bags, throwing everything on the bed. It was a shame he didn’t follow Lydia’s fashion advices; if he did, he would have three times as many clothes to cover himself with.

He sighed, getting ready for a miserable night, his teeth clanking together, and not just from the cold. 

***

Stiles was sleeping fitfully, his brow furrowed and covered in sweat. He didn’t see the figure quietly opening the door, slipping inside like he was just another shadow in the mostly abandoned building.

He didn’t see him lean over his bed, or his fingers fluttering against his forehead. All he knew was the ache of his muscles and the chatter of his teeth that played the back beat to his jumbled fever dreams.

The shadow huffed and put his coat on the back of a chair, slipping under the covers fully clothed and pulled Stiles’ shivering body closer, laying a warm hand on his belly, sneaking it under his shirt to get at the skin.

Stiles didn’t notice when his pain ebbed away, or when he stopped trembling from the cold.

Stiles slept.

***

Stiles didn’t think anything of it until he was finally home. His cold didn’t go away completely, but - to his surprise - he woke well rested in the morning. His throat was a bit achy and he had been sweating like a pig, but the worst has passed.

By dinner, he was home in good old Beacon Hills, lecturing his father about the poor diet choices he made in his absence. It was… good to be home. Scott wasn’t coming, not until Christmas. He decided to go on a short road-trip with Kira. Stiles couldn’t fault him, but he did miss his friend.

Still, getting into bed in his old bedroom that night was one of the best feelings in the world. Nothing changed - all his stuff was where he left it, even the half pair of socks kicked under the desk. It was like he didn’t even leave.

Stiles showered - again, still feeling a bit sticky with sweat - and pulled the covers over himself, turning to his side. He rubbed his face against the pillow, smelling familiar and scratched his belly sleepily.

Wait.

He blinked his eyes open in the darkness. Something… It felt like there was something he was forgetting. Something he should remember, but he couldn’t quite recall it. His fingers played against his belly absentmindedly and yeah… Something about that.

Last night…

He closed his eyes, trying to figure out what was bothering him, and in the darkness, under the covers he could finally remember the warm ghost-touch against his belly. 

What the fuck.

His mind whirred into alarm mode, trying to decide if this was something he had to worry about or just a figment of his imagination. Someone came into his room. Into his  _ bed _ . While he was in it.

***

That night, he spent hours going over his last few weeks. Did anything else unusual happen? Did he miss something? A sign? A warning.

Thos leaving without a word.

The snickers in the library.

His last night in the dorm.

Slowly, other things came to mind too. He couldn’t be sure if it was just his paranoia connecting dots that weren’t there or if they were real; finding his favorite pen - the one he thought he lost - in the mug he kept on his table. The couple of coupons he found slid under his door for the nearby pizzeria. A hundred other little things. They might have been a figment of his imagination, but the sinking feeling in his belly told him otherwise.

Once is an accident. Twice is a coincidence. Three times is a pattern.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea what happened, but this one of the rare occasions when a fic of mine has no sex???  
> Shocking I know, but it didn't feel right somehow.
> 
> This is still dedicated to the lovely LaughingCat, and all my thanks goes to the amazing Emma!

Stiles didn’t tell his dad about his big realization - he didn’t need him worrying about that too, even though the Sheriff obviously realized that something was going on.

No. What he needed was more infromation. Maybe he had a stalker, just a regular creep after him, but knowing his life - their life, because apparently this whole place was a fucking Hell Mouth - he had a feeling that there was something more to it. Something supernatural.

The first thing he did was consult the bestiary. Thanks to Lydia’s translation, they were finally all able to look at it whenever they wanted. There was also the Hale journals - the ones Peter had on his secret laptop. 

But, even after spending two whole days reading them back-to-back, he wasn’t any closer to the answer. It would have been easier if he knew the motivation behind what happened, but no matter how hard he raked his brain, he couldn’t come up with a single reason why a supernatural creature would give him Snickers.

He paid close attention to the entries of succubi and incubi, and all the other lust demons, because he couldn’t get the memory of that gentle touch on his belly out of his head. It didn’t feel sexual at the time, but well. Getting into bed with someone had to conceal some ulterior motive, right?

Still, nothing. The sort of creatures he suspected were really not that into foreplay, other than you know, actual foreplay. So, yeah. Those were out.

Stiles was baffled if he wanted to be honest. Sure, yeah, he was a spark, but according to Deaton, that wasn’t such an unusual thing; there could have been dozens of people with his abilities at the university - or even more powerful - who just didn’t have the misfortune of getting tangled in supernatural bullshit to find out about it.

Stiles really didn’t want to admit, but he was getting desperate. And, with most of his friends, even Derek, out of town, he had no other choice than to talk to Deaton. He hoped that for once in his life, he could get something useful out of him.

***

“So yeah. Tell me if I’m paranoid or something,” he said as he finished his account of his last few weeks. Deaton raised an eyebrow. “Wait, no. Scratch that. Don’t tell me that I’m paranoid, tell me what the hell is after me.”

The vet sighed, stroking his chin like a fucking evil wizard or something. Ridiculous.

“It would appear that you…” he looked off to mid distance, spacing out for a few second, then shook himself. “Well. It’s quite possible that… Oh.”

Oh.

What the hell did  _ oh  _ mean?

“What the hell does ‘oh’ mean?” Stiles asked, feeling desperate. He should have known that it would be impossible to get a straight answer out of Deaton. The man was a damned sphynx. Actually, knowing where he lived, he wouldn’t have been surprised if the local vet was an actual sphynx.

Deaton’s lips twitched at the tone, like he was incredibly amused by Stiles’ suffering. Maybe he was. Probably.

“I don’t think this is my area of expertise. Someone more…  _ In touch _ with the supernatural world would probably be better suited to answer your questions,” he said, cryptic as ever.

Stiles groaned, banging his head against the metal table he was leaning on. 

Deaton cleared his throat.

“Give me your phone, Stiles,” he said, and he handed it over without looking up. He just wanted to melt into the floor where none of this was happening. He had enough problems without a possible stalker, he didn’t need this shit.

He only straightened out when the vet put his phone on the table. Stiles glanced at the screen.

“You can’t be serious,” he said, not caring how close his voice got to being whiny.

Deaton had the galls to actually chuckle.

“Keep an open mind, Stiles.”

***

“Keep an open mind, Stiles,” he said to himself, trying for an intentionally awful impression of Deaton. “Yeah, right.”

His phone didn’t care, showing him Peter Hale’s number nice an clear.

Stiles wished his life would never have led up to him needing to give a call to Peter Hale. Well. Okay, the man was sort of insanely good looking... But that just made him more infuriating, seriously. Especially considering Stiles’ tendency to find that certain cocktail of intimidation and a hint of danger incredibly hot.

Stiles huffed. Just… like a bandaid. He could do that.

He dialed the number, closing his eyes as he stretched out on the bed. His dad was at work, so he didn’t have to worry about being overheard. Thankfully.

The phone rang, and he couldn’t decide if he wanted their resident asshole to pick up or not. On one hand; Peter Hale - annoying, infuriating son of a bitch. On the other… Well, it took a creeper to know a creeper, right? That sort of made sense.

“Hello?” Came Peter’s smooth voice from the little speaker. Stiles tried to tell himself that he shivered out of revulsion, and not at all because he might have missed hearing it in the last few months. Nope. No chance. Nada.

“Heeeey, Peter. What’s up?” he said, trying to sound… he didn’t even know what. Awkward? Because if he was going for that, he was absolutely  _ nailing  _ it.

“Oh? Stiles, what a pleasure,” the werewolf told him, sounding awfully amused, and Stiles sort of had enough of being people’s amusement. He had a problem. A serious one.

“Yeah. Whatever. So…” he had to take a second to lick his lips. “Anyway. Deaton gave me your number. I have a stalker problem.”

There was a second of silence from the end of the line.

“A stalker,” Peter said, going from amused to unimpressed in a second flat. Stiles had no idea what that was about.

“Yup. So, here’s the deal: I think someone scared off my roommate at uni. And - possibly - that same someone gave me snickers.”

The line on the other end was deadly silent, and he had no clue what to make of it. If nothing else, Peter loved to hear his own voice. 

“And also, someone broke into my room and… well. Sort of slept in my bed. With me. While I was sick.”

The man made a strangled sound.

“I see. Well, Stiles, in my professional opinion,” he said, voice careful, like he was actually thinking about how to phrase things “Someone is courting you.”

In the silence Stiles could hear with his mind’s ear as his jaw hit the floor and bounced on the wood a few times.

“The… I… a  _ what _ ?”

Peter chuckled, warm. No, that couldn’t be right.

“Courting me?”

“Yes, Stiles, that’s what I just said. Try to keep up.”

What. The. Hell.

“Yeah, no. What. Courting me? Are you sure? Because that’s, like, objectively insane.”

Peter tutted under his breath, and Stiles could hear him shuffling around, like he was getting comfortable.

“Well. I’m guessing that you weren’t very fond of your roommate?” Peter drawled, slow like he thought Stiles was an idiot. Which he was not, thank you.

And also. That was kind of true. But at the same time, he somehow didn’t think he should let Peter know that. The man had enough of an ego as it was.

“Well. I wouldn’t say that…” even to his own ears he sounded unconvincing. And then he remembered that werewolves had the whole lying thing figured out. Maybe. He didn’t know if it worked over the phone, but - unfortunately for him - Peter was currently the only person he could rely on. He didn’t want to piss him off with needless lying. “No, okay. Yes, I hate Thos. He’s an asshole,” he admitted, rubbing at his forehead.

Peter hummed.

“I see. Well, your…  _ stalker  _ was probably paying close attention to you, and wanted to make you more comfortable,” he explained. “He got rid of a major annoyance in your life, he provided for you, he nursed you in your time of need…”

Okay, so Stiles was pretty sure that Peter meant for all of that to sound reassuring, but it only made everything 10000% creepier.

“Oh my god,” was all he could say to that. Nothing else came to mind. Nothing.

“I mean, from what you’re telling me, this gentleman had ample opportunity to break your delicate little neck. Or have his way with your body. And he did none of that.”

Sure, that was true, but Stiles wasn’t any less creeped out by a complete fucking stranger only snuggling up to him platonically.

“Ugh. Oh my  _ god _ . Seriously, what do I do now?”

There was a pause.

“Well, that depends. Is it working?” Peter asked, like. Like that was even a possibility? In what…

“Holy mother of…  _ Peter _ ,” Stiles said desperately. “You are one of the smartest guys I know. In what universe does creepy stalking work as a romance tactic?!”

Peter laughed, and Stiles couldn’t really help his palms growing a bit sweaty from that sound bubbling right into his ear.

“Oh, my. Am I the smartest guy you know?” Peter asked, and he could practically see the shit-eating grin on his face.

Stiles groaned.

“ _ One of the smartest _ . Anyway. So very  _ not  _ the point of this conversation.”

Wait.

“Wait.” Stiles looked at his ceiling blindly. Fuck his life. Fuck his life sideways. With a cactus.

“Peter,” he asked, voice pained. “How are you so sure it’s a guy?”

Yeah, it could have been a general assumption, but then Stiles remembered how Deaton looked. He remembered that little ‘oh’ bright and clear before the vet insisted he called Peter.

Silence.

Stiles didn’t know if he wanted to cry or start laughing like a maniac.

“It’s you, isn’t it?”

He held his breath, not sure what he was hoping for. Peter sighed, and he could almost hear the way he rolled his eyes.

“In my defence, I was not going for the stalker vibe.”

Stiles took the phone from his ear and just looked at it for a second. 

His thumb hit the end button before he could even think about it, and he threw it to the foot of his bed, blinking into the slowly gathering gloom of his room.

It took him about seven seconds to grab it again, his blood thrumming with tension.

“I can’t believe how stupid you are. Scratch everything I said about you being even remotely intelligent. You are the worst. What… what the hell were you even thinking? This is not… it’s not normal behaviour, Peter, I swear to god. Couldn’t you just… like, buy me flowers? Or chocolate? Or hell, even curly fries? I mean, don’t get me wrong, it would have been really fucking suspicious and I probably would have slammed the door in you face at first, but come  _ on _ . I had the impression that you, like, dated and shit. Or at least met a human being. What the actual fuck? And to even think that-”

“So, would you have said yes eventually?” Peter said, cutting him off in the middle of a perfectly good rant.

Stiles blinked. Did he actually say that? Shit, he might have.

“Um. I have no idea?” he admitted, too surprised by the question to make up a lie.

Peter sighed, like the overdramatic martyr he liked to make himself out to be.

“Because that was my plan B, just so you know. I was hoping that you would appreciate creativity a bit more, but I can see how I might have been… misunderstood,” he said, the admission making Stiles’ lips twitch into a smile despite his best efforts.

The doorbell rang downstairs.

“Now get down here, and bring a vase.”

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me at udunie.tumblr.com
> 
> Please leave a comment if you liked it! :D


End file.
